This was the guy in command of 2BCT 1st Cav during our 2006-2008 deployment to Iraq. He dropped the hammer on anyone accused of sleeping around, and we suspected he himself was banging the JAG officer (a Major) while we were over there, but since he was the Big Bird (the Colonel) we couldn’t exactly mount an investigation on him. Looks like karma’s finally caught up to his politician ass.
“We could talk forever about the repercussions of me coming home, but it really made me feel like nobody’s telling anyone the truth—and not just in regards to war.”
Live From Iraq remains on my playlist to this day.
The ban on women serving directly in combat arms was for their own good. I guess it’s a good thing combat is winding down, so that the realization that the double standard that’s existed in the Real Military (that’s the Army and Marines, for those not following my meaning) since they first allowed women into uniform in the first place won’t get smeared so evidently all over the media as the trap that it is. I wonder how many females will have to break before they figure out that the double standard has set them up for failure from the start; moreover, I wonder how many soldiers will have to die before the suits and politicians figure out that it’s the double standard that’s at fault for the flag-draped coffins.
In the end, it’s going to come down to two options: either remove the double standard and force females to the same standards as males, or accept that they’re incapable of meeting those standards and let professionalism, morale, and lethality suffer under the harsh truth while lives are lost. In being so progressive, Panetta may wind up singlehandedly setting gender role equity back half a century, measured in corpses.
